The Surgeon's Love-Child

by Lilian Darcy

  A thought...a wish, so dark and horrible that she didn't even frame it into words, flooded her mind, and she felt sick. She gave a strangled sound.

  'I beg your pardon, Candy?'

  'Nothing,' she said quickly. 'I...should go. I need to get back to sleep.'

  'I just can't believe that. You're really sure you're ahead?'

  'I'm quite sure, Mother, dear!'

  But when she put down the phone, she didn't even try to sleep again straight away. Got restlessly out of bed instead, wrapped herself in a heavy cotton kimono and went out onto the deck, needing the air and the darkness.

  Did I really think it, even for a second? That it should have been Todd's baby that died...? That it would serve him and Brittany right for their betrayal? Oh, lord, what's happening to me?

  She buried her face in her hands and recalled that night's earlier thoughts about Todd with stark clarity as well.

  I wanted him to know that Steve and I had made love on the beach. I wanted to throw it in his face like a handful of sand and watch him grimace in pain and jealousy. That's wrong!

  Maybe it was human and normal, but it was still wrong, for more reasons than she could get straight in her head right now.

  It underlined her vulnerability, for a start. She wasn't over Todd, if she could fantasise about punishing him like that. Could a new relationship hasten the healing process or, more likely, would it only deepen the wound that the end of her marriage had made?

  How realistic was it to believe that she wouldn't get hurt again? Steve was a young, good-looking man who might be the town's most notorious womanizer, for all she knew. Telling herself that she only wanted an affair—and meaning it—wasn't necessarily a protection.

  And, finally, feeling like this about Todd was impossibly unfair to Steve.

  Images of her ex-husband taunted her. Memories of how he'd held Maddy as a newborn, how he'd whispered his pride to Candace, spoiled her with presents and flowers, champagne and chocolates and jewellery. He'd been smug about his virility, and she'd found that endearing at the time.

  Now, at this very moment, on the far side of the world, he was lavishing all these things—and more—on another woman and her newborn son.

  It's so, so unfair to Steve. I'm using him. Like a weapon. A revenge strategy. A knife in Todd's back. Which is laughable, because Todd will never even know.

  Taking Todd out of the equation, then, she was left with herself and Steve. His needs, and hers. His feelings, her vulnerability.

  I can't go on with this. My motives are too ugly, and I don't like to feel them in myself. I'm scared. I'm not ready.

  I'll have to tell him. I should have realised it and fought this whole thing much harder from the beginning.

  Candace didn't tell Steve of her decision for some days, hanging back out of consideration for Helen and Matt, and Steve's involvement in their tragedy.

  Little Robbie's funeral took place on Thursday morning, and Steve took six-year-old Jake and the three-year-old twins, Claire and Annabelle, for the rest of the day to give their grieving parents some time alone.

  On Friday the family went for a picnic, while Steve and Helen's mother, Barbara, boxed away the baby clothes, the little plastic bath, the bassinet and the snowy pile of nappies.

  Candace knew all this because Steve came over on Friday evening and told her, pacing her living room restlessly, his sentences jagged and broken. They discussed a couple of patients as well, over a beer and a bowl of corn chips, but when he leaned against the doorway to the deck and started talking about going somewhere for a meal and then back to his place, she knew it was time to speak.

  'I can't, Steve. I—It's best riot.'

  'Not?' He looked up, startled, his blue eyes suddenly bright with suspicion.

  'Best that we don't go on with this.'

  Silence, then, 'That's a...development, let's say.'

  He circled closer, bringing his gorgeous body into the range of her awareness. She was distracted by it. He must have showered before coming here, because the hair at the back of his head, just touching his neck, was still damp.

  She wanted to thread her fingers through it and fluff it dry. His T-shirt was untucked a little, bunched near that hollow in the small of his back which she loved to caress.

  She felt a tightness clamp around her throat, and a pull like a magnet between them. Awkwardly, she stepped sideways to stand behind the two-seater couch. It created a barrier which she needed.

  What can I say? What excuses can I come up with?

  The truth. That was the only fair thing. There had been such honesty in the way they had responded to each other. Honesty in every touch of skin on skin, and in the tumultuous climaxes they'd shared. She couldn't start lying to him now.

  'I realised...that this was too much about my feelings towards Todd,' she said carefully. 'It was about showing him that he wasn't the only one who could launch into some wild, sizzling—'

  'You told him about us?'

  'No!' She wrung her hands. 'Of course not! The showing-him thing was all in my head. You know, "Success is the best revenge." Who said that?' she demanded distractedly.

  'Ivana Trump, I think,' he drawled, his tone careful and hard to read.

  She gave a short laugh. 'There! Exactly! Another wife who lost her husband to a younger woman. I can't—I'm not going to do it. Not to you. Not to myself. We both deserve better.'

  'Better? I thought the other night on the beach was pretty good,' he said,-deadpan.

  'Yes. It was. It was fabulous. And all the way home, I kept thinking that I wished I had photographs. Proof of how good it was. So that maybe one day when I went back, I could carelessly leave them lying around on my coffee-table. Oh, nothing flagrant. Not really pictures of what happened in the dunes. But just of you and me standing on the beach in the sun, in our swimsuits, with our arms around each other, laughing.'

  'I'll go home and get my camera right now...'

  She ignored him. 'And Todd would find them. Or Brittany.' She pressed her palms against her eyes. 'That's.. .just horrible.'

  He was silent, and she blurted after a moment, 'See!'

  'See what?'

  'See, you're repulsed.'

  'I'm not.'

  'You should be!'

  'You didn't do it, though, did you?' he pointed out. He was still watching her carefully. 'And you don't intend to do it. Not really. You just fantasised about it. There's an awful long way to travel between the two.'

  'I wanted to do it'

  'And then you thought better of it.'

  'I was using you,' she insisted. '

  She heard the hiss of his breath between his clenched teeth and an impatient mutter, low in his throat, that she couldn't understand. There was another beat of silence, then he said, his voice rising, 'Yes. OK. Maybe you were.'

  He was still moving restlessly through the room, but his body was far more angular now. She was aware of his strength, the full force of his personality, the driving certainty of his mind.

  'What can I say, Candace?' he demanded. 'That I liked being used? That you should feel free to use me that way any time you like? No! It doesn't sit well, does it? You're quite right, there. Or I could argue that there was a lot more to it than that. A hell of a lot more. There was, and that's what's important. And I thought you might have had the courage to see it.'

  'Courage? This is taking courage! To admit the truth to you about my motivations.'

  'Part of the truth, Candace. One very small part.'

  'Steve—'

  'Stop, OK?' His jaw was hard and square. 'Have it the way you want it. It's over. I liked it while it lasted.'

  'Yes, yes, so did I,' she agreed, hardly knowing what an admission it was.

  Steve's voice softened again. 'The pleasure...and the need...whatever its source...wasn't all on one side by any means, Candace.'

  'No. I—I know.'

  He watched her for a little longer, and she felt her skin heat up and begin to tingle. 'N
o hard feelings,' he drawled.

  'Thank you,' she answered, while wondering if he really meant it.

  'And I'm still here if you need help with anything,' he offered. It was the kind of thing a man like Steve Colton would say, she guessed. Obligation more than anything else. 'I'm on call in emergency this weekend, but—'

  'Terry's back this weekend,' she cut in.

  'Terry doesn't have quite the same things to offer that I do.'

  The threat was blatant, seductive and unwanted, all at the same time. Memories and images of the things he had to offer came flooding into her mind. The things he had offered and that she had accepted, giving them back in double measure, finding a passion within herself that she hadn't known she possessed.

  Proving something. Showing off. Lashing out at Todd. Not in control of what was happening at all.

  'If you're saying that it isn't over,' she blurted, 'you're wrong.'

  This time he didn't argue, just said softly, 'See you around, Dr Fletcher.' And let himself out of her house.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  'How were they breaking on the weekend, Dr Colton?' Joe Sheddin asked.

  He was wheeling in Candace Fletcher's second patient for the morning. It was another Tuesday, and the visiting American surgeon's fourth surgical list at this hospital since she'd started work here.

  'They were breaking like a dream, Joe,' Steve answered the orderly. 'But it didn't do me any good. I was on call in A and E, second weekend in a row, and we were pretty busy. Ended up sending a few patients elsewhere, including one to Sydney and two to Canberra.'

  He could see Candace through the open doorway of Theatre One. She was on the phone and had a pen in her hand, hovering over some notes. Her hair was folded up onto her head in a thick pile that immediately made him want to thread his fingers through it and pull it down.

  Their relationship hung at a balance point that tortured him at the moment. He knew...every nerve-ending in his body knew...that she wanted him as much as he wanted her, and soon, very soon, he planned to challenge her determination to resist his pull on her senses.

  Not yet, he'd told himself for days now. Try it too soon, and you'll be back to square one. Another pointless argument about her ex-husband. She's not ready yet. But very soon...

  Ending her phone call to a doctor in Harpoon Bay, Candace put down her notes and went to scrub, listening to the conversation between the nurses with half an ear.

  'Oh, but I don't swim after the end of March,' Doreen was saying.

  'That's crazy! It's the best time of year for swimming, Doreen, really it is!' Pat answered.

  Was it Candace's imagination or was everyone getting more chatty? They had gotten used to her, and she had gotten used to the relaxed atmosphere and the friendliness of the staff. Her habit of formality, focus and silence in the OR was beginning to break down.

  Or perhaps it's because of Steve...

  For various reasons, setting up a regular Tuesday list in Narralee was working well for Candace. She then alternated surgery in Harpoon Bay and Shoalwater on Fridays, leaving the rest of the week clear for pre-admission and follow-up appointments, and the occasional emergency call. Since Steve's regular anaesthesia day was Tuesday, they saw each other in Theatre every week.

  Saw each other? That was a very weak phrasing. Their gazes clashed and clung over their masks. Their bodies pulled together like magnets. Even the sound of his clothing shifting against his skin drew the straining attention of her ears. And every casual exchange between them was laced with a golden thread of deeper meaning.

  She hadn't expected their working relationship to develop in this direction after she'd put the brakes on their affair. She'd expected tension. Brittle, hostile, unpleasant tension, and lots of it. But it wasn't like that. He had an aura of wicked and knowing awareness about him every time he looked at her or spoke to her and...yes...OK, that was why the mood in Theatre had changed.

  She found herself chatting to the other staff to break the tautly stretched fibres of her own awareness. She didn't want him to guess how often or how strongly she found herself reliving that night on the beach. Their other nights together, too.

  'Can you count for me, Eric?' Steve asked their patient. 'Backwards from a hundred, OK?'

  'Right, sure.' Eric nodded. 'A hundred, ninety-nine, ninety-eight, ninety-seven...'

  Seconds later, he was out. Steve checked his monitors. Pat wheeled a trolley closer to the table.

  This was another gall bladder removal. The patient was forty-eight years old and in good general health. Past abdominal surgery and consequent scarring had made him an unsuitable candidate for laparoscopic surgery, so Candace was taking the traditional route, opening up the abdomen with a long incision.

  It would necessitate a longer hospital stay, more painful recovery and more protracted convalescence, but in this case there was no choice.

  'Come with me to the sea pool by the harbour one day, Doreen,' Pat said, as the team began its work.

  They were still talking about swimming. Mr Kellett's abdomen was already stained a rusty red from its generous swabbing with antiseptic.

  'I didn't know there was a sea pool,' Candace came in. 'Scalpel, Doreen. Is it natural, or...?'

  She made a clean incision, working with the lines of his previous scarring as far as possible.

  'No, it's a proper Olympic-sized pool,' Pat explained. 'But it gets topped up by the incoming tide twice a day, and then it partly drains when the tide goes out, so the water's always fresh.'

  'Fresh salt water? Bit of a...what's the word?'

  'Oxymoron?' Steve supplied.

  'That's it,' Candace agreed. More scarring and adhesions were showing up now that she'd reached the abdominal cavity. He'd had a serious accident several years ago, and some impressive surgery to repair the damage. 'Gauze...no...yes, Peter, thanks, a bit closer, here.'

  'Fresh,' Pat repeated firmly. 'Because there's no chlorine. It's lovely.'

  'Freezing!' Doreen said, unconvinced.

  'You don't notice it after a few minutes.'

  They couldn't reach an agreement on the subject, and continued to bat it around as the operation proceeded uneventfully. There was a three-way split between the five locals. Steve and Pat were firm believers in year-round ocean bathing, whether in pool or surf. Doreen and Netta Robertson, assisting Steve with anaesthesia, were unimpressed with the sea pool. Assisting surgeon Peter Moody, holding a retractor in place, admitted that he could be coaxed into it in the right mood, even in July.

  'But I wouldn't make a habit of it,' he said.

  Candace felt that she didn't have enough data to go on.

  'I haven't been here in July,' she said.

  OK, here was the gall bladder, right where it should be, and she could feel through the fine latex of her gloves exactly why it needed to come out. Several stones in the common bile duct, and more in the gall bladder itself. If they stayed there, they often didn't cause major problems, but once they moved into the ducts, it was a different story. This patient had complained of pain and nausea, and had recently been treated for an infection. The organ was overdue for removal.

  'I'll take you for an early morning dip in the sea pool one day soon,' Steve promised lazily. 'And you can see what you think.'

  'And I'll come and watch, wrapped up in a big, thick coat,' Doreen said.

  'Yeah, and I'll sneak up behind you and push you in,' he threatened.

  Candace laughed...stones were coming out nicely...and felt that syrupy sense of delight that always washed through her when Steve had a smile in his voice.

  'We've got his temp climbing a bit here,' he muttered. The smile had gone. 'Thirty-nine point three.'

  'OK, thanks,' she replied. The duct was clear now.

  'Everything else is fine.'

  'I'm tying off the duct. We're making progress.' She continued to work, closing off the duct and the blood vessel at the base of the gall bladder. She wasn't particularly concerned about Steve's report. Her
thought train juggled two completely different subjects at once.

  Am I going to go for that swim in the sea pool with Steve? Need the cautery for this vessel... It's tempting. That's got it. No more bleeding... He makes me flutter inside, and he knows it. Blood's looking a bit dark.

  'Steve, how's his oxygen reading?' she asked casually.

  'Good. Normal.' Their eyes met for a fraction of a second above their masks.

  Does he think he's just biding his time, or something? Oh, hell, admit it, maybe he is. Yes, he is. I feel like we're both waiting for something to happen, for it all to start up again.

  The idea beckoned so powerfully that she was swamped with the sudden heat of desire.

  'Temp's over forty, now. That's a steady rise,' Steve said.

  'He's getting very sweaty,' Doreen commented.

  'Blood pressure, too,' Steve said. 'It was 90/60 a minute or two ago, now it's jumped to 124/85.'

  'Dark blood,' Candace said.

  'Temp's still coming up, and his heart rate is climbing, too.'

  'His hands are mottled.' Another observation from Doreen.

  'You've got dantrolene here, right?' Candace demanded urgently. 'Dantrolene sodium? Of course you have!'

  Pat went through the swing doors of the operating theatre at a run.

  'Malignant hyperthermia?' Steve said. 'Hell, is that what's happening?'

  Suddenly, the relaxed atmosphere shattered into a thousand pieces.

  'Has to be,' Candace said. 'How's his temp now?'

  'Over 41.'

  They all knew what malignant hyperthermia was, although it was rare. Most commonly, it was an inherited trait, a susceptibility to certain anaesthetic agents which resulted in rapid temperature elevation and usually hyper-tonicity—rigid muscle tone—as well. It could also occur in patients with certain other medical conditions or even, as in this case, in someone who'd previously undergone general anaesthesia with no problems.

  And it was fatal if not correctly treated in time.

  'Has to be,' she repeated. 'But I'm in the middle of the procedure. I can't close up yet.'

  'I'll start to reverse the anaesthesia, and you'll have time before he comes out of it fully. Just make it quick. I'll hyperventilate him.'